


Bring Me Back

by TypoShifter (Weezelness)



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Comedy, Gen, God Damn it Entrapta, Mad Science, Mostly friendshipping for now, Now you're thinking with portals, Or at least my attempt at Comedy, Rated T for minor swearing, When your ex-bestfriend turns into a child that you have to take care of, might change in later chapters, what's the tag for that?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-13 02:17:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19241815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weezelness/pseuds/TypoShifter
Summary: After one of Entrapta's experiments, Adora and Catra find themselves needing to deal with their past selves.Literally.Their younger counterparts need to make it back to their own timeline and it calls for a temporary truce, but that's just what it is. Temporary.





	Bring Me Back

The two young girls didn’t know where they were or why everything was so blindingly bright. It stabbed painfully into their pupils as they groped at the empty air in front of them. The last thing they remembered was being asleep, curled around each other to stave off the chill so characteristic of the Fright Zone. Suddenly, in the next, they were both wandering around in a strange void. To make things more terrifying, they no longer knew where the other was. They never should have disconnected hands, but the girls didn’t think they’d lose each other so easily, especially since it seemed like they could see for miles and miles ahead of them.

The taller of the two called out uncertainly, balling her tiny hands into fists and digging her blunted fingernails into her palm.

“Catra!”

She searched in the endless expanse but no reply came. She couldn’t hear anything except the beating of her own heart and the ragged breathing induced by her panic.

“Catra! Please, say something!”

Tears pricked at her eyes and she looked down with a whimper.

That was when she heard it, echoing off of nothing, like the repeated vocalization’s only purpose was to guide her forward.

_“It doesn’t matter. We’re leaving. NOW!”_

“Catra?”

_“Scorpia, start up the skiff.”_

The taller of the two gulped, racing toward the sound at a dead sprint. “Wait!”

She disappeared into the expanse, never realizing her tailed companion was only a hand’s reach away.

The other girl’s ears flickered but couldn’t make out a single sound, not even the strange buzz that came with its absence.

“Adora?” She asked hesitantly. “Adora where are you?”

Same as her friend, there was no response to be heard.

“Adora, this isn’t funny. I wanna go back. Adora?” She released a distressed mewl. She sniffed and gasped. Her keen nose picked up a familiar scent and panic overtook her as she raced towards it.

Traces of blood was always there in the Fright Zone. That was probably why she hadn’t noticed it before, but this scent, she knew the person who it belonged to.

“Hold on, Adora!” Her voice was thick with worry as she raced forward on all fours as the void swallowed her.

 

~

 

Entrapta hadn’t said much, or at least, not much that Scorpia or Catra could make out. She mumbled plenty under her welder’s mask, but the thing never stayed up or down for more than a handful of seconds, and it seemed like it’s owner switched topics as quickly as it flipped.

S _queak._ “—greatest discovery of our lifetime—” _Squeak._ “—continuum of existence called into question—” _Squeak._ “—implications for future quantum travel—” _Squeak._

She really needed to put more oil on those hinges. For all the time she spent improving any random gadget or machine that came her way, Catra had assumed the thing that was stuck to her face most of the time would take precedence.

 _Squeak._ “—experimentation of nature vs. nurture may finally—” _Squeak._

Obviously, that was not the case.

“Etherian hell, Entrapta! How much longer do you think you’re going to be?” Catra finally snapped, turning from her post by the temple’s entrance. “Seeing the Rebellion’s wonder trio is the last thing I need today.”

“I mean, there’s no guarantee that they’ll show up this time.” Scorpia gravitated to the two, taking a chance at joining the conversation. “I mean, sure they’ve shown up every other time, but they have to miss one eventually, right?”

Catra gave her a deadpanned stare and sighed. “Those aren’t good odds, doofus. Plus, I have a mountain of paperwork I have to get back to.” Catra’s tail whipped as she turned, pacing around the tiny room. “Do you have any idea how fast soldiers go through baton batteries? Like, what do they do? Eat them?”

Scorpia scratched at her head thoughtfully. “I think they just fire them, commander.”

“I—ugh! It was a figure of speech!”

Entrapta turned from her perch by a tower of First One’s tech. Long wires were connected to ports on the side while Entrapta held a tablet in her hand. A seemingly random amalgamation of bobbles stuck out from its casing, and Entrapta took a moment to adjust it as she addressed her companions. “I could modify the batteries for extra power with 50% more efficientcy and 10 times the battery life.”

Without missing a beat, Catra’s eyebrow raised. “Drawback?”

“10 times more likely to overheat and explode.”

“I thought as much.”

“I could make progressive improvements with field testing.”

Catra turned towards Entrapta and Scorpia with her arms crossed over her body. “Let’s focus on what we’re doing right now.”

At Entrapta’s kicked-puppy look and Scorpia’s concerned face, Catra couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “We can talk about your new experiment when we get back to the Fright Zone. Deal?”

Entrapta’s expression immediately brightened. The scientist gave an enthusiastic nod before she flipped her welding mask down, mumbling and fiddling with renewed vigor. Catra’s mouth twitched in half a smile that was more genuine than any smirk, and she rolled her eyes at Scorpia’s soft expression.

“Let’s get back to keeping guard.” She dismissed. “Those idiots are going to be here any second, I can feel it.

“I HOPE THAT MEANS YOU'RE READY FOR A HOT PLATE OF JUSTICE, EVILDOER!”

The voice boomed around the crystalline walls, followed by a softer whisper.

“Bow! You can’t just announce our position like that!”

“Sorry, Glimmer. She gave me the perfect opening. I couldn’t resist it.”

Scorpia nodded sagely. “It was the perfect opening. Can’t argue with that.”

Catra was starting to get a migraine, but fuck if that was going to stop her from making a quippy remark. “So we got Tweedledee and Twiddledum. That can only mean—.” Catra’s nose twitched and she ducked. She-ra sailed over her with a mighty war cry. “Hey, Twiddledumber. Welcome to the party.”

She-ra swung her sword in a side slash. Smirking, Catra pivoted on her foot and the sword whistled by her face. “Still as predictable as ever I see.”

“Not quite.” The sword transformed into a rope and with a flick of She-ra’s wrist, it changed its direction and tangled on Catra’s torso. “Grahhh!”

She-ra yanked the half-feline into a wall that caused the entire structure to shake. She promptly fell to her knee with a groan, cradling the shoulder that bore most of the impact.

Old instinct had Adora hesitating, taking every ounce of her power not to reach out. Instead, she just stood there with a grimace and a hiss through her teeth. She didn’t have time to react as Scorpia tackled her from the side.

“Don’t you hurt her!”

Glimmer jumped on Scorpia’s back in a burst of pink sparkles. “Too late!”

She held Scorpia, giving Adora enough time to recover. As she wound up, Scorpia closed her eyes, bracing for an impact that never came.

Catra lunged forward, one arm still dangling uselessly behind her. She used the other shoulder to topple She-ra. She’ll willingly admit that it was not her best decision. In fact, it was like running into a brick wall, but she saw Scorpia finally break free of Sparkle princess’s hold, tossing her over the shoulder like a plastic bag. She smirked. Then She-ra was in front of her, finishing the tie on her rope, immobilizing her arms against her body. Scorpia made a charge for Glimmer, only for a whizzing arrow to break in midair. It released a net that placed Scorpia in the same predicament as Catra.

Adora beamed, her smile equal parts elated and smug. “Looks likes this round belongs to us.”

Catra bared her teeth and growled. Her eyes grew hateful in a way Adora never imagined she could throw, not when she was the one on the receiving end.

Through the whole ordeal, Entrapta didn’t seem to notice or care that a battle was raging behind her and laughed in manic glee. A button, digitally projected on the screen, red and welcoming, beckoned her finger and she pressed it with gusto, the grin on her face stretching her mouth into painful proportions.

Adora saw the ropes around Catra’s body shining before Catra did, and she raced forward in a panic. The change in expression with Adora’s face alerted Catra that something had gone wrong and she looked down at her bindings with worry.

“What’s going on?” Catra’s voice was panicked as Adora attempted to pull her restraints apart.

"I'm not sure," the blonde responded.

"What do you mean you're not sure? It's your magic thing!"

That was when the temple began to shake and crumble, throwing the other three in disarray.

“Glimmer, look out!”

Bow threw himself towards Glimmer just as a piece of the ceiling impacted with the ground. Scorpia did a roll to avoid parts of falling rubble, while Entrapta’s giggling continued to escalate. There was an explosion as the rope around Catra’s body unwound and the two found themselves thrown in opposite directions. Catra was once again thrown to the wall. Her shoulder screamed and Adora’s head mercilessly bashed into a pillar. The blonde’s vision swam with little specks and warm liquid came away from her forehead.

Catra released a short scream as she pushed herself up, limping towards Scorpia. She severed the bindings placed on her by Bow with a single scrape of her claw and turned towards Entrapta. “Get your things to the skiff.”

The scientist twisted her head around and frowned. “But the data is still loading.”

“It doesn’t matter. We’re leaving.” When Entrapta turned a hesitant eye to the loading bar on her screen, Catra growled a bark. “NOW!”

Scorpia was about to say something when Catra rounded on her, putting up a hand to stop her in her tracks. “Scorpia, start up the skiff,” Catra ordered, turning her back on Scorpia’s crestfallen expression.

“Yes sir, Commander.”

Slowly and with hissing breaths, Catra limped away from the main antechamber.

Entrapta swung beside her on a purple lock of hair, a rare show of concern on her face. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Let’s just get out of here.”

Entrapta stayed silent for a moment. “Are you sure? Your face indicates pain. Are you not feeling pain?”

Catra grunted. “Let’s just go, okay?”

With a shrug, the scientist finally took the lead, heading into one of the tunnels. She looked over her shoulder and waited for Catra to shoo her onward before she eventually disappeared into its depth. Catra lingered and perked her ears.

“Adora, oh my gods. Are you alright?” Glimmer’s worried voice carried well across the ruined temple walls.

“I think I am.” Adora groans. “My head hurts.”

“You’ll be okay.” It was Bow that assured her this time and Catra felt herself relax.

She followed the direction Entrapta had gone and found herself outside within minutes. It felt like entering a different world. The fresh winds felt nice on her sweat soaked fur. The skiff was waiting for her with Entrapta and Scorpia already onboard. Scorpia waved at her from the rudder while Entrapta kept her back turned. It was a little strange, but Catra just figured that she was pouting from having her experiment disrupted. Catra rolled her eyes and climbed on board, biting back a yelp. She was sore, the result of being tossed about like a stuffed toy.

“Let’s go,” she mumbled tiredly, her eyes already half closed.

The skiff whirred to life as its engine picked up speed. The wind was quickly turning from comfortably cool to uncomfortably cold, worsened by the setting moon. The moonfall was already saturating the world in varying shades of orange and reds, setting the whispering trees in a color fire that made Scorpia ooh and aah as they drove past. Entrapta was mumbling again, talking into her recorder about something she’d found.

“—has produced a byproduct of temporal displacement that’s quite unexpected. More study will be required to—”

“Hey Entrapta, what are you talking about?” Scorpia asked, nonchalant as she tilts her head. The wind tussled the white strands of her hair, lined by a halo of orange light, as she glanced towards Entrapta.

The scientist met her gaze with a smile. “Oh, I was just logging my findings. It seems as if I messed up the coding of my temporal gateway generator. Fascinating unforeseen consequences—”

“She doesn’t understand, ‘Trapta,” Catra mumbled sleepily.

Scorpia nodded in agreement and Entrapta’s smile dipped by a fraction. She turned back to whatever had caught her attention, unintentionally blocking Scorpia’s view with her voluminous locks. “Oh, well I messed up the pro-gram to make por-tals,” she starts again, her voice coming out slow and painstaking, “It worked wrong.”

Scorpia grinned. “Oh, I get it. What did it do instead?”

Entrapta’s smile returned with full force and she turned her body to address Scorpia in her regular excitable tone. “Well, it brought back a younger Adora for some reason.”

Catra’s eyes snapped open and she flipped on her stomach like a convulsing pancake, propping her body up by her arms. “It did what?”

Entrapta moved like a spider, dragging herself to the side to reveal a young blonde, passed out on the deck. “She hit her head on the side of the skiff while you were inside. You didn’t see her?”

Catra’s jaw hung slack and she pushed out a huff of air like someone kneed her in the gut. It was quiet save for the howl of the wind as they sliced through it.

Scorpia tilted her head to the side, breaking the stalemate. “Oh, so that’s what ran into the side of the skiff.”

 

~

 

“Just take it easy, Adora.” Glimmer propped up Adora by her back while Bow knelt beside them.

“It looks like you hit your head pretty hard,” he said.

Adora gingerly placed a hand on the tender spot on her head, not surprised to see it coming away wet with a smidge of blood. “Sounds about right.”

Glimmer frowned with concern. “We should get you back to Brightmoon. The doctors need to have a look at that.”

Adora tried to stand, but the world began to spin, feeling like her own private whirlwind. She immediately felt her stomach turn. “Give me a minute. I think I’m going to hurl.”

Her two companions jumped like the floor had turned into molten lava around Adora, and they nervously exchanged glances.

“Okay, maybe it’s a little worse than we thought. We should really get you back to Brightmoon.”

Bow agreed with Glimmer’s sentiment, his face twisted in a grimace. “You know, it always sucks that you can get hurt in a bunch of places on your body, but as soon as you hit your head, it’s game over. What’s up with that?”

Glimmer sighed. “You know why, Bow.”

“I’m just saying that maybe we should start investing in helmets.”

“We’ll bring it up with my mom later or something.”

Adora lifted her hand in a halting motion. “Guys, please. I’ll be okay. Just…”

They were silent, finally allowing Adora a moment to catch her breath. All three of them were filthy, covered in dust and stray pebbles from the debris. The temple was unrecognizable but at least it had stopped shaking. The Super Pal Trio was no longer in sight and it was quiet save for their breathing. They felt comfortable by themselves, thankful that the battle had concluded so quickly. Glimmer still had juice for a quick teleport home, and Bow still had plenty of arrows for anything surprising that might come their way. Adora was a little worse for wear, but with She-ra’s healing ability and some rest, Glimmer was sure she would be back in tip-top condition before they knew it.

She kept her head on a swivel just in case. Even without the Super Pal Trio, First One’s Temples were vicious on their own. As soon as it dubbed you as an enemy, there was no telling what it could throw at you.

Okay, mostly it was spiders, but sometimes it had _other_ surprises along with the spiders.

So Glimmer kept her eyes open for things and mostly spiders.

She trailed the broken lines and cracks, wondering if this was all Entrapta’s experiment was suppose to accomplish. It was characteristic of the Horde. The savage organization’s primary purpose was destruction after all, but Entrapta was a scientist. Anything that she did, whether good or bad, was in pursuit of knowledge. It kept Glimmer guessing. If she was working on the Horde’s behalf, then at least Glimmer could rest easy, assuming that the extent of events was concluded, but if Entrapta was acting for herself, there was no telling what...

Glimmer squinted.

There was something there, two of them, one blue and one yellow, glowing in the shadows. The Brightmoon princess had to blink several times before it finally registered. By that time, she could only shriek as Catra jumped towards her, claws outstretched and fangs bared.

The figure released a diminutive growl that cracked at a particular octave. Not to mention, she was slow…slower than Glimmer anticipated when she swung her staff. She hadn’t expected it to connect and felt surprised when the weight transferred down the shaft. Glimmer opened her eyes, failing to remember when she’d closed them, and found a small ball of fur hitting the ground and bouncing with an “oof.”

Adora and Bow were instantly on high alert, eyes growing wide.

“This…its part of the concussion, right? Right?”

Bow slowly shook his head. “Nope. This is real.”

Glimmer’s jaw dropped to Etheria’s molten core as she watched the figure stand up.

There was no mistaking that wild mane of hair or those mismatched eyes, the furry complexion or the fangs that bit at her lower lip. Among those were details that caused them to pause. Catra had gotten a little chunkier, her eyes a little bigger, fingers blunted and small. Moreover, she’d shrunk to more than half their size. Really, it could have been stated in one word.

Glimmer felt herself stutter as she struggled to speak. “She’s—she’s…”

“SO CUTE!” Bow’s eyes glistened as he squished his own cheeks, valiantly attempting to keep himself back.

“Catra?” Adora breathed the word in disbelief, her heart thudding in her ears.

The de-aged, half feline, slowly turned her head, face scrunched in a way that was familiar, but lost in time. Tears burbled on the sides of Catra’s cheeks, and she hiccuped before releasing a powerful wail. The Super Pal Trio automatically covered their ears, ringing from the tearful cries of the future horde leader.

“Adora!” She ran into the arms of her much bigger best friend and sunk her face into her chest. The blonde wrapped a hesitant arm around the child and looked at the others. Her knitted brows held a deep confusion as she silently begged the other two for clarity.

Bow and Glimmer exchanged glances before they sighed.

Glimmer drug her hand down her face. “Let’s...get back to Brightmoon.”

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by artofkace
> 
> https://artofkace.tumblr.com/post/185597185067/got-a-request-asking-for-catra-and-adora-with
> 
> Dude has got some amazing art skills.


End file.
